This invention generally relates to oral hygiene devices and more particularly to a portable electrically powered toothbrush in which a unique combination of rotational and reciprocating motion is imparted to the tufts or bristles.
In order to promote and facilitate dental hygiene significant effort has been made in recent decades to develop powered tooth cleaning devices which improve upon the conventional hand held toothbrush. Many of these devices have been designed in view of new and improved dental hygiene techniques and brushing methods which have from time to time been suggested by researchers in the field.
These powered devices generally fall into one of two categories. The first category utilizes brush heads which closely resemble the heads of conventional unpowered toothbrushes and have tufts and bristles mounted in them. In operation these devices move the brush heads with respect to the handle in a variety of rotary, arcuate, reciprocating or orbital paths. The second category has brush heads which remain stationary with respect to the brush handle during operation and in which individual tufts are rotated or oscillated. Broadly speaking, the present invention falls into the second category of such devices.
It has long been recognized that the use of tufts having a circular motion is a highly effective cleaning technique and offers many advantages over the non-powered brush. The circular action not only cleans and brushes the surfaces of teeth but aids in the removal of stains from the teeth and has a therapeutic effect for gum tissue. It has been argued, however, that if the tufts are moved in a continuous unidirectional circular motion, the tips of the bristles will merely pass over most of the crevices in the tooth surfaces and between the teeth and the gingiva. As a result such brushes will fail to remove much of the dental plaque from tooth surfaces.
Accordingly, it is a principal object of this invention to provide for an improved powered toothbrush in which each individual tuft is rotated in an intermittent unidirectional manner about its axis and simultaneously reciprocated along that axis to provide better penetration by the tips of the bristles into tooth crevices and between the teeth and gingiva and thereby more effectively remove dental plaque from tooth surfaces and gingival tissues.
It is another object of this invention to provide for an improved powered toothbrush in which a greater amount of torque is delivered to the rotating tufts in operation than found in previously known devices.
It is a further object of this invention to provide for a powered toothbrush in which the brush head can be quickly and conveniently removed from the handle, thus permitting each user to employ his or her personal brush head when using the device and permitting the installation of various attachments such as tooth polishing devices to the handle.
It is a further object of this invention to provide for an improved powered toothbrush which is made fully portable by the use of rechargeable batteries as a source of power, which is relatively light in weight, and which is convenient to use.